(20-10-2013 09:38 PM)Revenant77x Wrote: Combination of factors. Death of leaders, the sheer scope of the area they had already conquered, bribes paid by the rest of Europe to appease the horde.

I'd say they could have raided a bit further, sure. The line of control in Rus is pretty much where the steppes stop and the forests begin; the Golden Horde could raid past that each year, but they never permanently occupied places like Novgorod. And after the first couple generations it wasn't a matter of raiding the one border but dealing with border raids and skirmishes and full on wars in all directions for them and the other successor states. Hungary and Romania make a great base of operations for them, if that works out. But marching a cavalry army through Bohemian winters is... not happening.

That's not to say they couldn't just grind through by building up local allies, as in China or Persia or Mesopotamia. But of course then the question is how 'Mongolian' they remain - a hypothetical "Mongol" Roman Emperor is a mirror image his Yuan counterparts. Who went very native very quickly, and even then not enough not to be overthrown almost immediately. And they failed in their attempts to project power much beyond their borders: Java was a disaster, they smashed up Dai Viet and Champa a little but went home with precious little to show for it, and they gave Japan a good scare before getting their shoddily built and/or hastily commandeered ships wrecked. Not that we can really say what would have happened in Japan if they'd gotten past the beachheads; it's a long way from Fukuoka to Kyoto.

Anyway. Past Poland and Hungary the situation would be much the same, I think. It's possible to wrangle a Mongol central Europe, if you lean on the scales. Just give Ogedai and Subutai a few more years on the scene. But it really is a matter of "if everything went right", because they'd still lack the logistics to march right to Portugal.

Which doesn't alter the fundamental instability and lack of coherence to the Mongol conquests. It's simply not possible to centralise something so vast when it takes years to get across it. And so the fragmentation will happen with a few more successor states as players on the fringes... But then, the farther from Mongolia, the more ephemeral those tended to be.

Oh no question the size and scope of their holdings made them impossible to govern. But if we are talking just conquer for the sake of doing it no one got closer to world domination than the Mongol hordes. Even today with 24/7 instant communication it would probably be impossible to govern the entire Eurasian continent.

(31-07-2014 04:37 PM)Luminon Wrote: America is full of guns, but they're useless, because nobody has the courage to shoot an IRS agent in self-defense

More likely CK2. There's an fictional historical expansion "The Sunset Invasion" where the Aztecs rose to power and invade Europe.

(20-10-2013 09:31 PM)Revenant77x Wrote:

(20-10-2013 09:23 PM)The_Thinking_Theist Wrote: Thanks for your politeness in your posting my friend!
The Mongols conquered for no (clear) reason other than the thrill of conquest and the spoils of war, so motive can be discounted especially back then. As for resources, my King Arthur stories say that post-Roman Europe was filled with leftover weapons and forts. Maybe some leverage there? I just can't stop thinking about the Aztecs sacrificing the nobles of England to Quetzalcoatl (I admit it used spellcheck for that word) on a pyramid next to the Thames.

Actually you hit on the one group that had a plausible chance of conquering Europe. The Mongols were just barely held back.

The Mongols are an interesting case though. Yes they conquered HUGE amounts of land, they hold the record for largest contiguous empire in world history (the British Empire being the biggest ever) BUT they quickly broke up into 4 different states, each very different than the other. And take the Golden Horde for example in Russia. Eventually the Russian states were able to defeat them.

It's sorta pointless to have this huge empire if the local people are just gonna kick you out.

If you wanna talk "what if" scenarios perhaps the best one is when the Chinese had a massive (and I mean massive) navy, including one huge motherfucker of a ship and they were exploring around India and parts of Africa etc..
If the emperor that came into power during this time hadn't decided to scrap the whole navy and complete halt Chinese exploration it is extremely plausible to assume all you yanks would be speaking Chinese right about now.

More likely CK2. There's an fictional historical expansion "The Sunset Invasion" where the Aztecs rose to power and invade Europe.

(20-10-2013 09:31 PM)Revenant77x Wrote: Actually you hit on the one group that had a plausible chance of conquering Europe. The Mongols were just barely held back.

The Mongols are an interesting case though. Yes they conquered HUGE amounts of land, they hold the record for largest contiguous empire in world history (the British Empire being the biggest ever) BUT they quickly broke up into 4 different states, each very different than the other. And take the Golden Horde for example in Russia. Eventually the Russian states were able to defeat them.

It's sorta pointless to have this huge empire if the local people are just gonna kick you out.

If you wanna talk "what if" scenarios perhaps the best one is when the Chinese had a massive (and I mean massive) navy, including one huge motherfucker of a ship and they were exploring around India and parts of Africa etc..
If the emperor that came into power during this time hadn't decided to scrap the whole navy and complete halt Chinese exploration it is extremely plausible to assume all you yanks would be speaking Chinese right about now.

They would have run into the same problem the Mongols did. Sure they could have perhaps won a few battles and may have been able to hold the land for a while but that stretched out with that long of a supply train never be able to hold onto it for long.

(31-07-2014 04:37 PM)Luminon Wrote: America is full of guns, but they're useless, because nobody has the courage to shoot an IRS agent in self-defense

(21-10-2013 09:23 PM)earmuffs Wrote: If you wanna talk "what if" scenarios perhaps the best one is when the Chinese had a massive (and I mean massive) navy, including one huge motherfucker of a ship and they were exploring around India and parts of Africa etc..
If the emperor that came into power during this time hadn't decided to scrap the whole navy and complete halt Chinese exploration it is extremely plausible to assume all you yanks would be speaking Chinese right about now.

Except for the part where intercontinental power projection isn't a thing in the 1400s. And also the largest ships weren't seaworthy, and it's three times as far across the Pacific as across the Atlantic. And also there's no impetus to go anywhere because there's no reason to.

You can spin increased influence through Indochina and Indonesia - but really you're talking 'just' big settlements of Chinese in the region and a strong influence on all economic transactions. Which, er, happened extensively in real life. Europeans didn't end up in total control of Oriental trade until the 1830s. Re-roll the dice and you can have everything from Thailand to the Philippines under a lot more Chinese influence - but past that it's really not plausible.

(21-10-2013 09:31 PM)Revenant77x Wrote: They would have run into the same problem the Mongols did. Sure they could have perhaps won a few battles and may have been able to hold the land for a while but that stretched out with that long of a supply train never be able to hold onto it for long.

(21-10-2013 09:23 PM)earmuffs Wrote: If you wanna talk "what if" scenarios perhaps the best one is when the Chinese had a massive (and I mean massive) navy, including one huge motherfucker of a ship and they were exploring around India and parts of Africa etc..
If the emperor that came into power during this time hadn't decided to scrap the whole navy and complete halt Chinese exploration it is extremely plausible to assume all you yanks would be speaking Chinese right about now.

Except for the part where intercontinental power projection isn't a thing in the 1400s. And also the largest ships weren't seaworthy, and it's three times as far across the Pacific as across the Atlantic. And also there's no impetus to go anywhere because there's no reason to.

You can spin increased influence through Indochina and Indonesia - but really you're talking 'just' big settlements of Chinese in the region and a strong influence on all economic transactions. Which, er, happened extensively in real life. Europeans didn't end up in total control of Oriental trade until the 1830s. Re-roll the dice and you can have everything from Thailand to the Philippines under a lot more Chinese influence - but past that it's really not plausible.

(21-10-2013 09:31 PM)Revenant77x Wrote: They would have run into the same problem the Mongols did. Sure they could have perhaps won a few battles and may have been able to hold the land for a while but that stretched out with that long of a supply train never be able to hold onto it for long.

There is a bit of Presentism at work here. We think we are so much smarter than the rulers at that time. That if we could run things we could rule the world. There were bad rulers and incompetent Emperors but they didn't last long and the nuts and bolts logistics of moving an army halfway across the world was not feasible until the mid 16th century. There is a reason why the 2 great canals (The Panama and the Red Sea) were so important and are still important today.

(31-07-2014 04:37 PM)Luminon Wrote: America is full of guns, but they're useless, because nobody has the courage to shoot an IRS agent in self-defense

Depending on how far back in history you go, there was more land mass as the oceans were lower which meant most of the continental shelf was above water which included many now submerged islands. Travel from Asia was possible on the land bridge across the Bering Sea. Centuries before Viking records, the Chinese sailed up and down the coast of North America.